An Ecocritical Reading of Selected African Poems

Abstract

This paper discusses some ecocritical ideas in selected poems by Kofi Awoonor, Kofi Anyidoho and the Negritude poets David Diop and Birago Diop. Drawing on postcolonial ecocriticism theory the paper focuses on ecocritical symbolisms and their ramifications in order to show how African poets attend to the environment, community and modernity’s many flaws. The consideration of the Negritude poems in this study stems from the fact that Negritude Literature in general and the selected poems in particular have been examined mainly within the context of Black African identity and the antiracist effort in general. The paper demonstrates that ecological motifs or symbols are deployed by some African poets to express life, survival, and nostalgia.